Anyone willing to purchase items in an item shop in a subscription based game are doing an utter disservice to their fellow consumers / gamers and completely toxifying the MMO market. Any item in the item shop should be available in-game. This is a standard of the MMO market (that subscription based games DO NOT get to do micro-transactions; go B2P/F2P for that model) and the fact you want to allow Blizzard to continue to exploit their position as market-leader in order to generate more profit for themselves is really frustrating.

As an informed consumer, I want the highest value bang-for-my-buck possible. Subscription fees are already fairly expensive, and arguably they are overpriced for the service provided. The fact that you then want to throw money at items that should be in the game is really maddening because you are depriving me of items. The development time that goes into the item shop should be spent on the game, making the game better and have more content. By spending in the item shop you are drawing development time away from (what should be) their focus and creating financially stratified content. It doesn't matter what anyone's personal finances are; the fact is that there are market standards and you want to erode them. Your lack of consumer activism is making it actively more difficult for those that are informed and trying to stand up for consumers to do so.

We should be holding companies to higher standards. I mean, why not?

(And Blizzard are the only company that can get away with this - I presume it's due to their market position - whereas smaller companies cannot. That is rank hypocrisy and I hate that people let Blizzard do so)

I highly doubt that. Just because something is being sold for real money that has no effect on the way you play the game, doesn't mean you would quite over that. But if you would, then I wish you good luck finding another game to play.

Dont discount his opinion, I myself would end my sub aswell. Wow is about obtaining things, remove that and we are left with nothing to play for.

According to the "logic" we have going in the other pay-to-win thread, selling items for real money wouldn't be pay-to-win anyway, since you can earn them via raiding/pvp anyway. I know, I laughed too. Oh, and an obvious "no" to the question posed.

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Originally Posted by Whitefolly

Anyone willing to purchase items in an item shop in a subscription based game are doing an utter disservice to their fellow consumers / gamers and completely toxifying the MMO market. Any item in the item shop should be available in-game. This is a standard of the MMO market (that subscription based games DO NOT get to do micro-transactions; go B2P/F2P for that model) and the fact you want to allow Blizzard to continue to exploit their position as market-leader in order to generate more profit for themselves is really frustrating.

As an informed consumer, I want the highest value bang-for-my-buck possible. Subscription fees are already fairly expensive, and arguably they are overpriced for the service provided. The fact that you then want to throw money at items that should be in the game is really maddening because you are depriving me of items. The development time that goes into the item shop should be spent on the game, making the game better and have more content. By spending in the item shop you are drawing development time away from (what should be) their focus and creating financially stratified content. It doesn't matter what anyone's personal finances are; the fact is that there are market standards and you want to erode them. Your lack of consumer activism is making it actively more difficult for those that are informed and trying to stand up for consumers to do so.

We should be holding companies to higher standards. I mean, why not?

(And Blizzard are the only company that can get away with this - I presume it's due to their market position - whereas smaller companies cannot. That is rank hypocrisy and I hate that people let Blizzard do so)

However, I'm aware of the issues that arise when you can "buy your way to world first". That's the one big issue. If some casual guild has a high ilvl on their gear, who cares? But buyable high-end endgame gear would just start an arms race between the top guilds of the world, of the region and of the server. It would destroy balance for the top 1% of the raiding scene.

I doubt Blizzard wants that because there is a certain hype around how skilled those players are and how they clear raids while undergeared. So it makes no sense to offer something like that in the shop. And for anything lower than that... well, I'm fine with you buying your T15 while I'm progressing through T16 already. You can catch up in gear, and we can recruit you.

If they added rare mounts to cash shops they would have to increase the drop rate since they wouldn't be rare anymore. Maybe allow it on cash shop 1-2 expansion after they were relevant. Even then it wouldn't do any good. So my overall stance is no, cash shop should be different mounts than available ingame.

Anyone willing to purchase items in an item shop in a subscription based game are doing an utter disservice to their fellow consumers / gamers and completely toxifying the MMO market. Any item in the item shop should be available in-game. This is a standard of the MMO market (that subscription based games DO NOT get to do micro-transactions; go B2P/F2P for that model) and the fact you want to allow Blizzard to continue to exploit their position as market-leader in order to generate more profit for themselves is really frustrating.

As an informed consumer, I want the highest value bang-for-my-buck possible. Subscription fees are already fairly expensive, and arguably they are overpriced for the service provided. The fact that you then want to throw money at items that should be in the game is really maddening because you are depriving me of items. The development time that goes into the item shop should be spent on the game, making the game better and have more content. By spending in the item shop you are drawing development time away from (what should be) their focus and creating financially stratified content. It doesn't matter what anyone's personal finances are; the fact is that there are market standards and you want to erode them. Your lack of consumer activism is making it actively more difficult for those that are informed and trying to stand up for consumers to do so.

We should be holding companies to higher standards. I mean, why not?

(And Blizzard are the only company that can get away with this - I presume it's due to their market position - whereas smaller companies cannot. That is rank hypocrisy and I hate that people let Blizzard do so)

Please think about the structural context that you reside in.

I love you for posting this.
Sometimes it's depressing to read these narrow-minded, short-sighted posts.

Anyone willing to purchase items in an item shop in a subscription based game are doing an utter disservice to their fellow consumers / gamers and completely toxifying the MMO market. Any item in the item shop should be available in-game. This is a standard of the MMO market (that subscription based games DO NOT get to do micro-transactions; go B2P/F2P for that model) and the fact you want to allow Blizzard to continue to exploit their position as market-leader in order to generate more profit for themselves is really frustrating.

As an informed consumer, I want the highest value bang-for-my-buck possible. Subscription fees are already fairly expensive, and arguably they are overpriced for the service provided. The fact that you then want to throw money at items that should be in the game is really maddening because you are depriving me of items. The development time that goes into the item shop should be spent on the game, making the game better and have more content. By spending in the item shop you are drawing development time away from (what should be) their focus and creating financially stratified content. It doesn't matter what anyone's personal finances are; the fact is that there are market standards and you want to erode them. Your lack of consumer activism is making it actively more difficult for those that are informed and trying to stand up for consumers to do so.

We should be holding companies to higher standards. I mean, why not?

(And Blizzard are the only company that can get away with this - I presume it's due to their market position - whereas smaller companies cannot. That is rank hypocrisy and I hate that people let Blizzard do so)

Please think about the structural context that you reside in.

Very well said, it should shut all of these people up who say ''what does it matter to you if I buy these?''. Its getting really tiresome to hear that

If it was just vanity pets, mounts and rare, non equipment items I wouldn't care one bit. If someone wants to shell out $100 for Mimirons Head then so be it. All this poll really shows is the amount of special snowflakes and paranoid people thinking "once they start that, pay to win will follow". I play the game for fun, not to pretend I am some sort of WoW celebrity because I ride on a mount that required 24 other people to help me get.

If someone wants to shell out the cash to avoid trying to get 25 non incompetent people together or spend 20+ hours of grinding then let them.

No, there needs to be a line in the sand. It's getting to the point where it's starting to look like pay to win. What's the point of doing hard content, if you can get the same rewards by just paying for it?

I checked yes seeing as my option wasn't available which is "As long as it's not gear, I.E raiding gear/pvp gear" mounts and what not I couldn't care less.

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Originally Posted by jmac28083

My answer is no.

No, there needs to be a line in the sand. It's getting to the point where it's starting to look like pay to win. What's the point of doing hard content, if you can get the same rewards by just paying for it?

To me that's just selling out.

He said mounts etc nothing about gear.

History will have to record that the greatest tragedy of this period of social transition was not the strident clamor of the bad people, but the appalling silence of the good people - Martin Luther King, Jr.

Anyone willing to purchase items in an item shop in a subscription based game are doing an utter disservice to their fellow consumers / gamers and completely toxifying the MMO market. Any item in the item shop should be available in-game. This is a standard of the MMO market (that subscription based games DO NOT get to do micro-transactions; go B2P/F2P for that model) and the fact you want to allow Blizzard to continue to exploit their position as market-leader in order to generate more profit for themselves is really frustrating.

As an informed consumer, I want the highest value bang-for-my-buck possible. Subscription fees are already fairly expensive, and arguably they are overpriced for the service provided. The fact that you then want to throw money at items that should be in the game is really maddening because you are depriving me of items. The development time that goes into the item shop should be spent on the game, making the game better and have more content. By spending in the item shop you are drawing development time away from (what should be) their focus and creating financially stratified content. It doesn't matter what anyone's personal finances are; the fact is that there are market standards and you want to erode them. Your lack of consumer activism is making it actively more difficult for those that are informed and trying to stand up for consumers to do so.

We should be holding companies to higher standards. I mean, why not?

(And Blizzard are the only company that can get away with this - I presume it's due to their market position - whereas smaller companies cannot. That is rank hypocrisy and I hate that people let Blizzard do so)

Where were all you same people who defended Blizzard with microtransactions when Dead Space 3 got launched

I think with Dead Space 3 it's different. It's a single-player game (with co-op). There isn't anyone to compete with in that game.
However I get what you mean. I hated that they put that shit in Dead Space 3.